Gazing into the crystal ball

My column today asks four venture capitalists and one private equity investor to predict what will happen in the business community in 2006.

Here are some of the more interesting predictions:

Wal-Mart will buy Amazon.com.

The Nasdaq will close the year up 47 percent.

Three to four new space travel companies will form.

Microsoft’s stock will rise 30 percent.

Google will lose 20 percent of its value.

In fact, the responses on that last one — whether Google’s stock will increase or decrease in 2006 — were pretty interesting. Three of the five investors said the stock would go up this year. The investors also disagreed on the number of IPOs coming in the state, with guesses ranging from one to six.

Gazing into the crystal ball

My column today asks four venture capitalists and one private equity investor to predict what will happen in the business community in 2006.

Here are some of the more interesting predictions:

Wal-Mart will buy Amazon.com.

The Nasdaq will close the year up 47 percent.

Three to four new space travel companies will form.

Microsoft’s stock will rise 30 percent.

Google will lose 20 percent of its value.

In fact, the responses on that last one — whether Google’s stock will increase or decrease in 2006 — were pretty interesting. Three of the five investors said the stock would go up this year. The investors also disagreed on the number of IPOs coming in the state, with guesses ranging from one to six.